December 30, 2014

The Executive Life of New York (ELNY) liquidation, which occurred on April 16, 2012 represented the dominant structured settlement story of 2011, 2012 and 2013 and one of the most important developments in the history of the United States structured settlement industry.

Related follow-up litigation continued during 2014. Individual ELNY shortfall payees filed class action lawsuits against various structured settlement brokers. Other ELNY shortfall payees and their attorneys lost their appeal of a Contempt Order.

Class Action Lawsuits

Separate (but nearly identical) class action lawsuits were filed in Florida and Oregon during 2014 on behalf of ELNY shortfall victims against named and unnamed structured settlement brokers. In the Florida case, against EPS Settlement Group (EPS) and various brokers, a federal judge granted defendants' Motion to Dismiss the plaintiffs' claims with prejudice on December 17, 2014. The Oregon case, which remains unresolved, names Ringler Associates Incorporated (Ringler), Paul Hoffman (as the individual agent who brokered structured settlement annuities for the named plaintiffs) and John Does 1-100 as defendants.

Note: A prior and separate class action lawsuit filed in New York in 2012 by ELNY shortfall victims against Benjamin M. Lawsky, Superintendent of Financial Services of the State of New York, Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (MetLife) and Credit Suisse Group, AG (Credit Suisse) as defendants was voluntarily dismissed in 2013 without prejudice.

Oregon Class Action

The 2014 Oregon class action Complaint was filed in U.S. District Court and alleges Ringler, Hoffman and John Does 1-100 violated state statutes and their alleged duty of care to ELNY shortfall victims whose structured settlements were funded with qualified assignments and who resided in states where ELNY was not licensed to sell insurance when their settlements were consummated.

The John Does 1-100 "represent those individual insurance brokers who, as employees and/or agents of Ringler, its affiliates, or predecessor companies, brokered the sales of the SSAs at issue in this case, of which members of the proposed class were beneficiaries." The complaint further states "that with proper discovery into the matter these Defendants can be identified, and the complaint can be amended at a later date to include the individual names of these Defendants."

The Complaint against defendants Ringler et al. (Defendants) identifies two causes of action:

Although the negligence counts do not state specific amounts of damages, the statutory violation counts claim "Plaintiffs and Statutory Subclass members are entitled to damages for the fulI amount of their unpaid claims pursuant to the State Statutes."

Defendants filed a Motion to Dismiss on June 26, 2014 plus a subsequent Request for Judicial Notice in Support of their Motion. On December 5, 2014 a Magistrate issued:

Opinion and Order - granting in part and denying in part Defendants' Request for Judicial Notice.

Findings and Recommendations (to be referred under advisement to a district judge) - that Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss should be granted in part as to Defendants’ alleged continuing duty to inform plaintiffs that their coverage may be threatened due to ELNY’s declining financial condition and otherwise should be denied. Note: Although the Magistrates' Findings and Recommendations identifies December 22, 2014 as the due date for any objections, S2KM has been informed that Defendants requested and received a scheduling extension.

ELNY Contempt Order

In response to the 2012 New York class action lawsuit, Judge John Galasso issued a Contempt Order on January 25, 2013. He also imposed a $5000 fine and threatened additional fines plus imprisonment of legal counsel if the ELNY structured settlement shortfall payees did not dismiss their Federal action which they did (without prejudice) on February 7, 2013.

The ELNY shortfall payees who filed the New York class action and their attorneys appealed Judge Galasso's Contempt Order which was argued before the Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Division Second Judicial Department on October 3, 2014. On November 5, 2014, the Court issued an Order dismissing the appeal by the shortfall payees and affirming the Contempt Order as to their attorneys.

Reliance Liquidation

Reliance Insurance Company was declared insolvent in 2001 and the Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner was appointed as Liquidator. The Reliance Estate, however, remained open and its assets, until November 4, 2013, included approximately 3,400 structured settlements of which approximately 3093 involved annuities issued by United Pacific Life Insurance Company, a former Reliance subsidiary which Reliance sold in 1993 and which is now known as Genworth Life Insurance Company.

Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Judge Bonnie Brigance Leadbetter signed an Order on November 4, 2013 approving a Transfer and Assumption Agreement whereby Reliance will transfer all Reliance-owned structured settlement annuity contracts and corresponding payment obligations issued by Genworth Life Insurance Company to a new corporation, the Genworth Annuity Service Corporation.

At one time a major provider of structured settlement annuities, Genworth and its life insurance affiliates have subsequently received financial downgrades by various rating agencies. As of this blog posting, for example, Standard & Poors rates Genworth Life Insurance Company as BBB+ which qualifies as "high yield" or "non-investment grade" - the same "junk bond" category that characterized ELNY's investments before it entered rehabilitation in 1991.

Conclusion

In its recent SEC filings, JGWPT Holdings, Inc. warns potential investors for its structured settlement securitizations about investment risks including "the insolvency or downgrade of a material number of structured settlement issuers".

Should structured settlement recipients receive similar warnings about the potential (or actual) financial deterioration of their structured settlement funding entity(s)?

What is the scope of post-settlement responsibilities, if any, for structured settlement brokers and/or settlement planners?

Should a structured settlement broker (defense or plaintiff) or settlement planner be legally responsible for warning structured settlement recipients if and when an annuity provider or assignee experiences a deteriorating financial condition?

What about the annuity provider or assignee itself?

If any such legal responsibilities exist, what criteria would define a deteriorating financial condition?

For prior S2KM summaries of ELNY and Reliance with additional informational links, see:

March 31, 2014

In addition to its other accomplishments (most notably publication of "Standards of Professional Conduct for Settlement Planners"), the Society of Settlement Planners (SSP) has distinguished itself by sponsoring educational programs addressing issues, featuring speakers and permitting perspectives the more defense-oriented National Structured Settlement Trade Association (NSSTA) traditionally has been reluctant or unwilling to offer.

SSP's 2014 Annual Conference, to be held April 27-29 in New Orleans, promises to continue this more open-minded educational tradition.

SSP's Secondary Market Panel, which will be moderated by Patrick Hindert (S2KM's Managing Director and blog author), should be educational and entertaining - and hopefully somewhat controversial. Here are some of the questions the featured panelists will address.

Overview

Is the secondary market good or bad for the primary structured settlement market?

Among other objectives, IRC 5891 and the Model State Structured Settlement Protection Act (Model Act) were enacted to protect claimants from predatory secondary market business practices. Both NSSTA and NASP supported these statutes. How successfully have these statutes accomplished their objective to protect structured settlement recipients?

Based upon your experience, what changes or amendments, if any, would improve the Model Act?

Would adding a multiple bid requirement as part of the "best interest" test improve the secondary market?

What have NASP, NSSTA and/or other primary market participants done to address these issues? What should they do?

Falsified Orders

Reports indicate a former paralegal at the New York law firm Paris & Chaikin falsified as many as 100 transfer orders?

What happened? What is the status?

How will these events impact the secondary market and its various participants including: the law firm, its secondary market clients, the annuity providers and the structured settlement recipient/transferors?

Anti-Assignment Restrictions

Recent (Brenston) and current class action (Sanders) cases in Illinois address the impact of "anti-assignment" restrictions on transfers of structured settlement payment rights.

What is the status of these cases and related litigation? What are the issues?

Does the recommended assignment language in NSSTA's Model Qualified Assignment and Release Agreement solve this problem - or is some other solution necessary?

What case-specific responsibilities do structured settlement brokers, settlement planners and other plaintiff advisers have related to anti-assignment restrictions?

Primary Market Responses

MetLife recently adopted controversial new business practices whereby it opposes transfers that involve split payments as well as court-approved servicing arrangements.

What is MetLife's rationale and objective?

How are these business practices impacting the secondary market?

The Florida state legislature is considering a bill that would add a maximum discount rate (similar to North Carolina) to its existing protection act..

Is this a good idea?

How has the North Carolina provision impacted the secondary market in that state?

Why haven't more annuity providers offered commutation-like alternatives to third party factoring transactions? What impact would such alternatives have on the existing primary and secondary markets?

RLS Arbitrations

RLS (formerly Rapid Settlements) has attempted to use the Federal Arbitration Act to side step state structured settlement protection statute requirements.

What is the status of the related RLS litigation?

Conclusion

What other secondary market issues do you see as important for the future of structured settlements?

What opportunities exist for primary and secondary structured settlement market cooperation? What is preventing this cooperation?

For background about these secondary market issues, see the structured settlement wiki and more specifically these prior S2KM blog posts:

S2KM previously reported that a New York law firm had falsified court orders approving structured settlement transfers in as many as 100 cases - and possibly more. Industry sources have identified the responsible law firm as Paris & Chaikin where a former non-lawyer employee, apparently created the fraudulent, court-related documents. The primary transfer companies represented by Paris & Chaikin in these transactions were J.G. Wentworth, and its affiliate Peachtree Financial Solutions, as well as Stone Street Capital.

Paris & Chaikin has retained Pery D. Krinsky , according to industry sources, as outside ethics counsel for assistance with these cases. An online 2013 Speaker Biography states in part: "Pery’s ethics-based defense litigation practice focuses on: attorney ethics matters, representing judges before the Commission on Judicial Conduct, criminal defense matters, art law ethics & litigation matters, and representing law school students before the Committees on Character & Fitness. Pery serves as the Chair of the Ethics Committee of the Entertainment, Arts & Sports Law Section of the N.Y. State Bar Association. Pery also serves as Chair of the Committee on Professional Discipline of the N.Y. County Lawyers’ Association."

Ongoing investigations of these fraudulent transfers are being conducted by the New York State Courts and the New York County District Attorney's Office. Primary and secondary market representatives with whom S2KM has discussed these fraudulent transfers disagree on how they are impacting judicial attitudes toward structured settlement factoring transactions and factoring companies in New York.

Proposed Amendment to IRC 5891

Representative Matthew Cartwright (D-Pa) has introduced H.R. 3897, a bill which, if enacted into law, would amend IRC 5891 and impose standards and procedures which are substantially different than currently provided by the Model State Structured Settlement Protection Act (Model Act) and almost all of the 48 related state statutes.

The most controversial provision of H.R. 3897 appears to be proposed new paragraph (5) under current subsection (b) titled "Transaction Requirements" which would provide in part: "(A)" In General - A transfer of structured settlement payment rights shall be treated as satisfying the requirements of this paragraph only if the transfer meets the following requirements:

"(1) The annual discount rate of the consideration for the transfer, determined by taking into account charges, fees and other expenses, does not exceed the prime rate plus 5 percentage points.

"(2) The aggregate amount of the charges, fees and other expenses payable by the payee do not exceed 2 percent of the value of the consideration to the payee (net of such charges, fees and other expenses)."

This H.R. 3897 language is similar to provisions in the North Carolina structured settlement protection act. North Carolina is one of only three states which currently impose statutory ceilings on discount rates. A recent bill to amend the Florida structured settlement protection act likewise proposes a discount ceiling similar to North Carolina.

Note: following years of conflict, the primary market National Structured Settlement Trade Association (NSSTA) and secondary market National Association of Settlement Purchasers (NASP) reached an agreement in 2000 to support a combined federal and state legislative solution for structured settlement transfers which resulted in IRC 5891 and the Model Act. It is S2KM's understanding this agreement remains in effect.

Peachtree Settlement Funding v. Cathy Brenston

In 2013, an Illinois 5th District panel, sitting for the 4th District Illinois Court of Appeals, held that an Illinois state court, which had previously approved transfers requested by Brenston:

Had a duty to enforce anti-assignment provisions in Brenston's original structured settlement documentation; and

Had no authority under the Illinois protection act to approve the transfer petitions - even though all of the relevant parties had waived the anti-assignment provisions.

S2KM has learned that a companion case involving Peachtree and Brenston remains on appeal in the 3rd District Illinois Court of Appeals and will be argued February 27, 2014. The parties had previously stayed their appeal waiting for the Illinois Supreme Court to rule on the 4th District case.

In a recent Florida case, summarized in this Drinker BiddleStructured Settlement Alert, a Sumter County Circuit Court Judge cited the Brenston case as authority in ruling that an April 2011 transfer order was void ab initio, and that resulting arbitration awards were “impotent and without substance.”

During NASP's 2013 Annual Conference, NASP Executive Director Earl Nesbitt reported that MetLife has begun actively opposing transfers that involve split payments as well as court-approved servicing arrangements. Under such servicing arrangements, structured settlement annuity providers typically remit the entirety of specific periodic payments to transfer companies to administer even when the original recipient/transferor only assigns a portion of the payments.

Primary market proponents of MetLife's new policy argue that at least 27 state structured settlement protection acts prohibit partial transfers. In addition, they maintain that servicing contracts represents an annuity provider obligation and that post-transfer problems can occur from subsequent, multiple transfers resulting from such occurrences as divorces, child support obligations and improper transfers by trust beneficiaries.

In response, Nesbitt believes this "Hobson's choice", forcing injury victims to sell all or nothing, will cause "deep trouble" for MetLife and other annuity providers who may adopt MetLife's split payment policy. Nesbitt argues that annuity providers are protected by stipulation agreements and administrative fees. He predicts litigation, legislation and attorney general investigations could result.

Stock Market Prices

JGWPT Holdings, Inc. - JGWPT Holdings IPO, which occurred November 8, 2013, was poorly received with JGWPT Inc. reducing the initial offering price of its common stock from $19-$22 per share to $14.00 which then traded down to the high $12s. Since then, the common stock, which now trades on the New York Stock Exchange (symbol: JGW), reached a high of $18.00 per share and closed Friday January 31 at $16.992 per share.

Asta Funding Inc. - Asta, a publicly traded company (Nasdaq: ASFI), acquired an 80% ownership interest in CBC Settlement Funding, LLC ("CBC"), a structured settlement factoring company on December 31, 2013. Following announcement of the purchase on January 7, 2014, Asta's stock price closed during regular trading hours at $8.28 per share. The stock closed Friday January 31 at $8.20 per share.